The Curious History of Scent in Media

OVR is working to bring scent to digital experiences in a fresh and exciting way that will be transformative for storytellers and consumers alike, which we will reveal soon. Until then, we wanted to explore the history of scent in media - a fascinating journey of technical leaps aimed at our enduring desire for a richer, more sensory experience in storytelling. 

The integration of scent into media has been a long-standing pursuit, captivating inventors and storytellers with the promise of fully immersive, multi-sensory experiences. While sight, sound, and touch have been readily incorporated, the addition of scent has remained a challenge, marked by numerous ambitious endeavors and unconventional implementations.

Early Smell Experiences: The Rose Bowl, Smell-O-Vision, and AromaRama

Smell-O-Vision inventor Hans Laube alongside Hollywood producer and champion Michael Todd, Jr.

You have probably heard of some early attempts at this in cinema and television, such as Smell-O-Vision (we get this one a lot) and AromaRama in the 1950s and 1960s, but the history actually goes much further. In 1906, entrepreneur and theater owner Samuel “Roxy” Rothafel created the earliest attempt at influencing media experiences with scent at his theater in Forest City, Pennsylvania. He used a fan to disseminate the aroma of rose oil throughout a screening of a documentary about the Rose Bowl and its iconic parade. It was a simple but effective technique, however he learned quickly, as did other scent pioneers at the time, the bigger challenge beyond delivering scent was getting rid of it. Various scents would linger and compete with each other and become overwhelming for audiences, and the idea was shelved for a few decades. 

The theater premiere of Smell-O-Vision in 1960 for the film Scent of Mystery.

By the 1950s, the burgeoning popularity of television pushed theater owners to tinker with the film formula again to find innovative ways to lure audiences back. After its debut at the 1939 New York World’s Fair, Smell-O-Vision made its first theater appearance in the 1960 film Scent of Mystery. The technology was designed to inject 30 distinct olfactory elements at exact points in the movie directly to the individual seats of movie-goers, enabling them to recognize scents that would be clues to the murder mystery plot. The attempt was a huge technological leap for synchronization and delivery, but it was powered by compressed air, which made it a rather noisy experience, and the scents, traveling through a system of pipes, reached some parts of the theater later and often created a confused experience. 

The AromaRoma experience attempted to use air conditioning systems to pump scent into a theatre.

AromaRama (“You must breathe it to believe it!”) aimed to avoid these challenges by leveraging the existing air conditioning systems of theaters to pump scents throughout the auditorium at once, claiming up to 72 different fragrances that could be released and dissipated rapidly to make sure the smells corresponded closely with the visuals on screen. However, between scenes of scents, the air was supposed to be cleared by a “purifying treatment,” but according to one reviewer, that fragrance left a sticky sweet smell for hours that itself became unsettling (NY Times, 1959). Another critic hammered the AromaRama experience during the film Behind the Great Wall, claiming the scene of a “beautiful old pine grove in Peking, actually smelled like a subway rest room on disinfectant day” (Time Magazine, 1959). Yikes! 

Despite the challenges and poor audience reception for both films, these were exciting technical leaps in the evolution of media scent delivery that should be applauded. These early experiments focused on different types of delivery systems, perfected the timing of dissemination, and began solving the problem of dissipating the scents between scenes; however, audiences felt the scents were unrealistic, not in sync with the storytelling, and overall became unpleasant experiences that were distractions from the films themselves.

Scratch n’ Sniff is Introduced

In contrast to these overly complex and ultimately unsuccessful scent systems, the 1970s and 1980s saw the rise of a simpler, more tactile approach to olfactory media: Scratch 'n' Sniff! This new approach was developed by 3M and involved microencapsulation, a process that allowed fragrances to be sealed within tiny capsules and released when the surface was scratched. 

In 1981, John Waters incorporated Scratch 'n' Sniff into his satirical film Polyester, using "Odorama" cards to enable viewers to smell scents at specific points in the movie. This served as a lighthearted homage to earlier attempts at scent in cinema. The concept was further popularized by MTV in the 1980s, with a home version of the "Smell-O-Vision" experience for the movie Scent of Mystery, using Scratch 'n' Sniff cards sold at convenience stores.

Specific episodes of The Simpsons and Rugrats also used Scratch 'n' Sniff cards as promotional tie-ins, demonstrating the potential of scent to engage audiences. Although primarily used as marketing gimmicks, these various applications of Scratch 'n' Sniff highlighted the possibilities of incorporating scent into media and entertainment.

Modern Approaches in the 1990s and 2000s

Disney’s Soarin’ Over California attraction.

In the 1990s and early 2000s, theme parks, notably Disney, leveraged scent technology to enhance the immersion and storytelling of their attractions. For example, in the It's Tough to Be a Bug show at Disney's Animal Kingdom an unpleasant odor is used to emphasize the appearance of a stink bug on screen, and the Soarin' attractions employed a range of evocative scents, including orange blossoms, pine forests, and sea air, to further immerse riders in the visuals. These iterations helped prove that precisely delivered scents can significantly enhance the narrative and sensory experience of digital media. 

This era also saw the first attempts to integrate scent with interactive media and video games, including a PC peripheral, iSmell (yes, you read that correctly), that would release scents triggered by websites or emails. While the concept was intriguing for some, the device was costly and the library of scents limited. Similar endeavors (even some iPhone accessories) aimed to bring olfactory experiences to digital platforms, but have encountered comparable hurdles.

What’s Next?

For over a century, the aspiration to engage all the senses in storytelling has driven innovation in media. The dream of creating a truly immersive experience where stories come alive through sight, sound, and smell has yet to be fully realized. Despite the elusive nature of scent integration, its potential to transform storytelling and enhance the consumer experience remains undeniable.